March – April 2014

SAN FRANCISCO PREMIERE! DIRECTOR LANCE BANGS & SLINT GUITARIST BRIAN MCMAHAN IN PERSON! Feature length documentary about the band Slint and the Louisville music culture they emerged from. Throughout the 1980s, a group of friends in Louisville, Kentucky grew up forming bands, breaking up, and reforming in different configurations. They were playing hardcore shows at ages 10-12, touring with Samhain as 14 year olds, recording for Homestead as Squirelbait at age 15, then formed Slint in their late teens and recorded the classic album Spiderland before they were 21. They broke up before the album’s release, giving no interviews and vanishing into their own shadows. Two decades passed as filmmaker Lance Bangs assembled unseen footage of the teenagers writing and arranging Spiderland as well as the first on camera interviews with the band members and their contemporaries trying to decipher what they had been through. Featuring Slint, Steve Albini, Ian Mackaye, David Grubbs, David Yow, James Murphy and archival material from Will Oldham. Dir: Lance Bangs. 2014. Digital. Thursday at 7:15pm & 9:45pm and Friday at 9:30pm.

In Wiebke von Carolsfeld’s STAY, Taylor Schilling (Orange is the New Black) and Aidan Quinn play two lovers—Abbey & Dermot—caught at a crossroads, each struggling to find a place to call home. The couple reside peacefully in Connemara, amid the beautiful Irish countryside, until Abbey’s pregnancy is revealed and Dermot struggles to accept the responsibilities of fatherhood.

SAN FRANCISCO PREMIERE! FILMMAKER IN PERSON! What does Jackass, Pavement, Earl Sweatshirt and Elliot Smith have in common? That would be Portland, Oregon-based Lance Bangs, a filmmaker who has a hand in everything cool from the last 25 years, basically. Since we already have him here with his totally awesome new documentary about Slint (BREADCRUMB TRAIL, screening 3/20), we’re taking this opportunity to take a peak inside his archives! Lance will be screening music videos, documentary excerpts, short films, concert footage, and experimental collaborations ranging from iconic bursts of pop culture to rarer unreleased pieces. Among the subjects: The Arcade Fire, Belle & Sebastian, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Cat Power, Earl Sweatshirt, Ghostface Killah, Guided By Voices, Kanye West, LCD Soundsystem, Menomena, Neutral Milk Hotel, Nirvana, No Age, R.E.M., RZA, The Shins, Sleater-Kinney, Elliott Smith, Sonic Youth, The White Stripes, and The Yeah Yeah Yeahs. 7:30pm, Digital, 100 mins.

Two demons—slinging sex, drugs and chaos—attack the lives of a struggling San Francisco couple. In writer/director JP Allen’s dark, seductive comedy, a man is shocked to find a demon smoking a cigarette in the living room of his apartment. Soon, as the man’s girlfriend jogs alongside the ocean, a beautiful second demon appears. The two demons weave temptation, drugs and violence into a thrill ride that will either save or destroy the couple—or maybe do both. Filmed in spectacular locations in and around San Francisco and Mount Tamalpais. Starring Chris Pflueger and Lucia Frangione. Directed by J.P. Allen. Digital. 2014.

Join FILM CULT for a five-hour mission at the ROXIE THEATER to celebrate Canada’s finest, WILLIAM SHATNER, turning 83! Party with a Film Cult Triple BILL presented by your favorite interstellar hostess, KLINGON VANNA WHITE (Speakeasily, Vortesque)! Shat-Shorts before Features! Boldly get “SHAT-faced”!

THE HORROR AT 37,000 FEET
Will Shatner’s drunken, cynical ex-priest be able to save a celeb-filled passenger flight from Death-By-Satanic-Relic? Get onboard the Shatner Birthday Party Plane to find out! 16mm film projection! Starring William Shatner, Chuck Connors, Buddy Ebsen & Tammy Grimes. Dir: David Lowell Rich. 1973. 16mm. 7pm.

IMPULSE
Shatner boldly takes his acting to strange new dimensions as a paranoid and pimped out conman/gigolo/literal ladykiller in the mutherfuckinest of all Midnight Movies! In Shocking 35mm! Starring William Shatner, Ruth Roman, Jennifer Bishop & Harold Sakata. Dir: William Grefe. 1974. MIDNIGHT.

“CADET SPECIAL”: SINGLE FEATURE ADMISSION $9 “CAPTAIN’S PACKAGE”: SEE ALL 3 FULL-LENGTH FEATURES FOR $20

Presented by Docunight, in collaboration with National Iranian American Council

In 2004 filmmaker Taghi Amirani gained unprecedented access to Shargh, at the time Iran’s leading reformist newspaper. With full official permits from all the relevant Iranian authorities he went behind the scenes with the paper’s young journalists as they went about their job of reporting and commenting on a wide range of social, cultural and political stories. Amirani’s camera follows the journalists on assignments and at home as they offer rare insights not just about journalism but also about post revolutionary Iranian society. Made in the final year of President Khatami’s second term in office, RED LINES AND DEADLINES is a film made by an Iranian with Iranians that tries to stay clear of clichés about Iran presented in western media.

Director: Taghi Amirani. 2004/5.

About Docunight

Every last Tuesday of every month, Docunight will screen a documentary about, around, in, made by Iran or Iranians. The screenings will take place on the same night across several cities, including San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, London, and Dubai (the list of locations is growing). Docunight films will be diverse in subject and will run the gamut. All films will have English subtitles.

CHEAP THRILLS follows the one-night descent of two friends participating in a series of escalating paid dares to entertain a wealthy couple with a twisted sense of humor. After down-and-out family man loses his job and is served an eviction notice, he runs into his long-lost deadbeat pal at a bar. As the two drink their troubles away, they are lured by a couple celebrating a birthday, who shell out obscene wads of cash in exchange for taking on harmless bets. The party continues to a strip club and eventually to the couple’s home, where the cash payoffs increase wildly as the challenges become more outrageous, hilarious, illegal and even downright inhuman. Drugs and laughter give way to sex, firearms, felonies and self-destruction. Directed by E.L. Katz. 2014. Digital. 9:30pm.

Valencia the novel put the experiences of an entire generation of lesbians on paper through the lens of one hard-loving and hard-drinking dyke. Punk rockers, riot grrrls, and simple, artsy freaks suddenly had a heroine to look up to and a mecca to head toward. This highly anticipated film adaptation of Valencia gives a whole new generation of fabulous, artsy, genderqueer folks an opportunity to reinterpret and reinvent the tales of this iconic novel one chapter at a time. Various directors. 2013. Digital.

CHEAP THRILLS follows the one-night descent of two friends participating in a series of escalating paid dares to entertain a wealthy couple with a twisted sense of humor. After down-and-out family man loses his job and is served an eviction notice, he runs into his long-lost deadbeat pal at a bar. As the two drink their troubles away, they are lured by a couple celebrating a birthday, who shell out obscene wads of cash in exchange for taking on harmless bets. The party continues to a strip club and eventually to the couple’s home, where the cash payoffs increase wildly as the challenges become more outrageous, hilarious, illegal and even downright inhuman. Drugs and laughter give way to sex, firearms, felonies and self-destruction. Directed by E.L. Katz. 2014. Digital.

In the middle of an uneventful summer on the outskirts of Brooklyn, Lila, a lonely fourteen-year-old from Gravesend, turns her attentions to Sammy, an older thug she sees at Rockaway beach. Wanting something to brag about, she weaves a story about him and becomes fixated on seeing it realized. When her attempts fail, she propels the lie even further, claiming they’ve had sex. During her sexual quest, Lila turns from predator to prey. IT FELT LIKE LOVE captures the confusing emotions and developing identity of an adolescent girl that explores what could euphemistically be called love. Starring Gina Piersanti. Directed by Eliza Hittman. 2013. Digital.